


Down By the Seaside

by jonesyjonesyjonesy



Category: Led Zeppelin
Genre: Angst, Dadcore, F/M, Fluff, NSFW
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-29
Updated: 2021-01-23
Packaged: 2021-03-11 05:27:34
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 17,150
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28399950
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jonesyjonesyjonesy/pseuds/jonesyjonesyjonesy
Summary: Between parenthood and touring, you and your husband have grown distant, good roommates more than partners. When John suggests a weekend by the seaside to reconnect, you’re hesitant at first. After all, how much difference can the sea air really make?
Relationships: John Paul Jones/Original Female Character(s), John Paul Jones/Reader
Comments: 7
Kudos: 6





	1. an invitation

**Author's Note:**

> part i – an invitation
> 
> “I wouldn’t mind watching you brew the coffee and dust the mantle. That sounds just…I don’t know, that sounds just lovely.”
> 
> fluff/angst/eventual nsfw

A weekend by the sea was his idea. To get away from everything.

You were hesitant at first. Not for any good reason, other than inertia. A body at rest will stay at rest and you have been resting to a fault these days, even with a four-year-old in the house. The weather had sapped your energy – gray and drizzly.

Usually, you’re able to spend your days out in the garden with your daughter while he’s away. Reading inside by the window just isn’t the same. You want to be out in the sun while your daughter squeals chasing butterflies.

John had been home a little less than a week when he suggested this trip. It was a welcome surprise, his return, a few days earlier than expected. Your daughter had a monopoly on his time now, as it should be (you had to remind yourself of this every now and again) and as quick as he arrived, you all fell into your comfortable domesticity. As if he was never gone. 

His returns used to be marked by riotous laughter, visits with friends and family, dinners, drinks, late night talks, and, of course, excessive amounts of “making up for lost time”, as John liked to put it cheekily. But now, with parenthood on both your shoulders, life took on a different meaning now.

You like it that way, for the most part, although sometimes the “what ifs” cross your mind, the unlimited and unexpected possibilities you think escape you in motherhood. 

That night, John must have noticed how you sighed while you were sprawled across the sofa, turning from page to page, while you listened to him laze about on the organ. That’s when he asked.

His playing had stopped abruptly. You looked up at him and found his eyes on you intently. “What’s the matter?” he asked.

“Nothing.”

“Come now,” he eschewed your answer with a small smile. He leaned forward and watched you from his place behind the organ.

It felt like you sat like that for minutes, in silence. An unusual moment after all the time you had been together. You couldn’t remember the last time you shared a longing glance, or felt a silent wandering of the eye. You had both been so busy and so separate.

He stood and made his way to the couch where you were lounging. “May I?”

You laughed and lifted your legs for him and he sat, inviting your legs to rest on his thighs. He put a hand on your calf, his long fingers grazing your skin. “We should go away.”

“What do you mean?”

“On a trip. For a while. Or a bit.”

“John.”

“What?”

You couldn’t think of a reason not to and yet you had said, “No, I couldn’t possibly,” and attempted to bury yourself back in the book. 

“Is it so ridiculous to want to go on a trip with my family?”

“No, not ridiculous,” you replied, not looking up from the page.

With a hint of mischief, he reached over and put one finger in the gutter of the book. He didn’t have to snatch it, your hands relaxed slowly and he drew it away from you. He put it to the side and then leaned over you again, arm hooking around the tops of your thighs. “You keep hiding yourself in your books.”

“And you,” you point at him and circle your finger admonishingly. “– sit behind the organ.”

“Oh, I’d like to sit behind an organ.”

“John!” you laughed, jabbing him in the arm. He can be doggish when he wants.

He blushed, but you knew he wasn’t embarrassed. “I suppose I do spend a lot of time over there, don’t I?”

“Which I don’t mind. At all. Especially when you spend all day running around with her, you can do whatever you want.”

You remember how he bit his tongue, holding back another lewd comment and deciding firmly against it. Instead, John relaxed into the back of the sofa, cocking his head to the side and raising an eyebrow. “But what about you? And me?”

“What about you and me? You’ve been gone, you two have catching up to do.”

“And so do we.”

“Yes,” you conceded. “Yes, so do we, but it’s different, isn’t it? It’s less…feels less important. And that’s fine, that’s the way it is. We’ll get around to it. Eventually.” 

“Eventually,” John had repeated quietly.

And in that moment, his eyes, shifting across your face, trying to read what exactly you meant, broke your heart. You both went quiet. It never eluded you, reality and how it unfolds. But John always took time to readjust to home life after being on the road which, as you had heard from his countless stories, was full of unfathomable, ridiculous antics.

From the silence, he asked, “It feels like I miss a lot, doesn’t it?”

“For her, maybe. But not on my account. All I’m doing is brewing coffee and dusting the mantle. Boring, compared to all you get up to, mm?”

He smiled – a sad sort of smile, his eyes cast down on the floor. “You know, that doesn’t sound all that boring to me.” He took a deep breath and added, “I feel like I miss a lot.”

“John, don’t beat yourself up about it. It’s just coffee. And dust,” you said with a small laugh.

John laughed along with you half-heartedly, smile fading with his stampeding thoughts. “I wouldn’t mind watching you brew the coffee and dust the mantle. That sounds just…I don’t know, that sounds just lovely.”

You couldn’t tell where his mind was. But you knew he was treading water desperately to find his point. “Oh, John…” you muttered. You sat up and leaned forward, putting your hand against his cheek. John’s eyes fluttered closed, leaning his face into your hand, and letting out a deep hum, remembering your touch again. It made you glad you still had that effect on him.

“What are you thinking?” you asked eventually, your fingers twirling through the hair at his temple.

His eyes suddenly popped open, meeting yours in a desperate fashion. “You know that I would give it up for you, you know that, right?”

Your breath caught in your throat. “No, John, please –“

“Stop, listen, Y/N, if you want me to I will.” 

This was the exact choice you had always dreaded. A part of you desperately wanted to tell him – yes, come home. Stay home forever. Wrap yourself up in the little world we have created. Make yourself a part of the scenery, a part of her world. But it would never sit well with you. You shook your head. “I know you would. And I don’t want you to.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes.” And you meant it. You still do. 

He pressed his lips to the inside of your palm. “You say the word. Whatever you want. Whatever. I mean it.”

“I know you do.” You knew he did.

With a newfound energy, he gripped your hand tight, and leaned toward you. His icy eyes bore deeply into yours and a winning, tight-lipped smile had crept onto his face. “Let me take you. Somewhere warm.”

And how could you have said no to that?


	2. for the sunshine

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Between parenthood and touring, you and your husband have grown distant, good roommates more than partners. When John suggests a weekend by the seaside to reconnect, you’re hesitant at first. After all, how much difference can the sea air really make?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> part ii – for the sunshine
> 
> “I couldn’t help myself. Hilarious, the notion of your complete modesty.” 
> 
> fluff/hinted nsfw/eventual nsfw

That’s how you ended up on a train car toward the sea. You’ve packed a few books for the trip but you can’t get comfortable enough to read; you keep getting distracted by the scenery that rushes past in effusive green and blue bursts.

“Y/N.”

You look across from you at John. He nods down toward your daughter, sitting on his lap with her face pressed up against his chest and her mouth hanging open. She’s snoring lightly. You can’t stop yourself from giggling and, with an effort not to wake her, he does too.

You watch the two of them. Your daughter’s leg dangles freely over his knee, swinging gently as the train rushes down the tracks. John pulls the hem of her light green dress further, straightens out the fabric, and mumbles something about her not wanting to get cold. You look up at his face – you’re always amazed how soft and kind his face is while simultaneously having such sharp features.

His cloudy blue eyes dart up to yours, as if he has felt you looking. A curious smile appears on his lips. “What?”

You’re caught off guard. “What?”

“I asked first.”

You don’t have the words, but if you did, you would say that you feel like your heart is hungry, like the Tennyson poem. Your heart beats fast as he continues to stare, expectantly waiting for your answer. You finally say, “I’m admiring the scenery.”

“Always admiring the scenery.”

You give him a once over. “There’s a lot to look at.”

“Oh, well,” he looks away, redness blooming on his cheeks. “I’m sure not that much.”

You grin. Though the flirting happens less often these days, the reward is always greater.

Up ahead, the clouds are breaking and the sun is starting to touch the earth again. The heaviness in the pit of your stomach lifts. To see the world lit up again inspires you. For the first time in a long time, you feel settled. You feel lighter. You look back to them – John still gazes down at your daughter and tightens one of his hands against her back, bringing her close to his chest. It’s a perfect picture, one you would like to be a part of.

You stand and move toward the empty seat next to John.

“Where are you going?”

“Can’t I come sit next to you?” you say with a little shrug.

“Oh, yes, of course, please.”

“Please, Y/N,” you tease as you plop into the seat beside him. “Please, sit next to me, I’ll die if you don’t.”

John laughs, “Oh, shut up.”

You lean into him, “Make me.”

And he does, tenderly kissing you on the lips. A simple kiss, not one for the ages, but it’s the one you need. A reminder. When you pull away, your eyes meet and you have to catch a breath; John’s gaze resonates a potential energy that terrifies you in the best way possible. His lips curl into a small smile, almost as if to suggest he could do that a thousand more times if you let him.

And you will. You would right now if you weren’t toting around a four-year-old on a half-full train car.

You look down at your daughter, still fast asleep on his lap, a small bit of drool now on his shirt. You reach over and stroke her hair, the same color as her father’s. You lean on John’s arm and dissolve into them, a seamless addition to the picture.

John watches you. In a low voice, he asks, “You want another one?”

You give him a sidelong glance. “You’d like that, wouldn’t you?”

“I’d like to try.”

“Yes. I’m sure you would like to try. And try, and try, and try, and –”

“What’s so wrong with that?” John asks. His free hand makes its way to your knee, gently moving the fabric of your dress away to touch your skin.

You feel a flutter in your stomach. “You’re playing a dangerous game.”

“I like a little danger now and then.”

“I am someone’s mother,” you say sarcastically.

His hand travels further up your leg, to the softness of your inner thigh. “What’s that matter?” John says with a cocked smile. You can’t help but smile. Motherhood always seemed like the death of sex and intimacy to you, especially according to your own mother. And while you certainly don’t see it that way now that you are one, it’s comforting to know he doesn’t see it that way either.

You peer down the train car at the other travelers, each in their own, quiet world.

“Playing coy, are we?”

“I’m always coy.”

“Oh, please, not always,” he says and a deep laugh escapes him. Your daughter flinches against him. “Oh dear,” he murmurs, tightening his hand against her back. You both watch her closely as she relaxes again in to his arms, still sound asleep.

You wrap a hand around his arm and whisper into his ear, “That was a close one.”

“I couldn’t help myself,” he responds in kind and adds, offhandedly, “Hilarious, the notion of your complete modesty.” You flush, all the way down to your collar. His eyes roam over to yours and he continues, “You should probably return to your seat before I get any more ideas.”

The timbre of his voice melts all the way down to your thighs. “Ideas are more than welcome, they’re encouraged,” you reply. You give his arm a squeeze and then return to your seat.

You both temporarily distract yourselves, him with the scenery and you with one of the books you brought, a copy of selected E.E. Cummings poems; a bad choice for the state you’re now in. You have to read each page several times before you actually find yourself retaining the words. You’re getting idea, so many ideas. And you know you will have plenty more between now and time you actually get to enact any of them with your husband, what with your daughter in tow.

Finally, you pull into the station. The squealing train wheels awake your daughter with a start – it’s as if she was never asleep, her eyes wide and bright. “We’re here, darling,” John says, helping her look up out the window.

“It’s so sunny here.”

She misses it too, the sun out in the garden. Quickly, you take her hand and you walk together off the train, John not far behind with your luggage. Out of the dank and fussy train car, you feast your eyes on a quaint town at the base of a cliffside. You don’t need to see the seaside to know it’s close, just from the way the air smells.

“Up ahead,” John says, joining you two on the platform. He starts to lead you down from the train platform to a path that splits – one toward the town and the other toward a mossy stone staircase that leads up the cliffside.

“Up the stairs?” your daughter asks.

“All the way up,” he answers.

In the blink of an eye, your daughter leaps ahead of the both of you, bounding upward.

“Slow down, you don’t know where you’re going!” you call after her, picking up speed.

“Yes, I do! Up!” she hollers without even turning to respond.

You follow her up the stairs, at first briskly. But you feel time catch up to you and your breath running ragged. Your steps falter and you stop to catch your breath.

“Getting old, hm?” John calls from behind you. 

You turn, a grinning gape on your face. “You’re an ass!” you hiss.

He laughs, “I’m old too, don’t throw a tantrum.” He’s also taking a pause, unbuttoning the cuff of his shirt and rolling up the sleeve.

“You need some help?”

“No, no, I’m fine. It’s just warm,” he answers, starting in on the other sleeve. “It’s nice out, though, isn’t it?” 

You smile and walk down to meet him. “It’s lovely,” you say and reach for one of the bags.

“Leave it.” You feel his arms wrap around you and with an ease you can’t explain; you fall into him, deeply inhaling his scent, like the dew early morning in the garden. He presses a kiss against your cheek. “You happy?” he asks.

“Yes.” Desperately happy. You gaze down at his bare forearm and run a finger down one of his more prominent veins. Always makes you shiver. Then you giggle, despite yourself, like a child, and look back up at him.

John is so relaxed, you can tell just from his lips, parted so delicately in repose. When he comes home, while full of excitement, there is an edge about him that must come with the constant pace of being on the road. It usually takes him a few weeks to shed it.

Your intense desire to kiss him is one that can’t be denied, so you do, leaning in and planting a kiss squarely on his lips.

He didn’t expect it, you can tell from the way he gasps, almost trying to get a word out. But it doesn’t matter; he settles in without missing a beat, and draws you closer (if that were even possible, your entire front already right up against his). You can feel him entirely and you know this could get you in a world of trouble were you to continue. John pulls away first, the bridge of his nose going red. “Good, I’m glad,” he says, trying to catch his breath.

“Thank you for dragging me out here,” you tease, starting to disentangle from him.

“Dragging you?! Nonsense, come back here,” he cries out, reaching for you again. 

You laugh as you’re pulled back into his orbit, welcoming his hands any place he can get ahold of you. “I’m kidding! I’m kidding, let me go!”

“What are you doing?!” you hear your daughter howl.

Your hands drop from one another as your attentions shifts entirely to her atop the steps. She scowls, her hands on her hips. Her green dress already has mud across the front of it. John calls up to her, “Looks like you’ve already found trouble, darling!”

“Yes!” she grins. “Come on!”

“What do you say?” you call up after her with a knowing look on your face. You have been working on this and you’re not going to let her spoil it.

She rolls her eyes. “Come on, please.”

“Better,” you say. Not great, you think.

John, only slightly unkempt, but attempting to recalibrate, picks up one of the bags again. As you reach for one as well, he swats your hand away and says, “Go. She said please.”

You reluctantly leave him behind to catch up to your daughter who waits for you, tapping her foot impatiently. “Where did you learn all that, hm?” you ask her.

“From you,” she says, smiling at you, showing off the gap left behind by her first lost tooth at the front of her mouth.

“Certainly not,” you reply. “Race you, come on!”

The two of you run up the rest of the stairs and, between her laughter and the exhilaration of just a kiss and the possibility of so much more, you make it with ease.

At the top of the steps, you walk out into a clearing where the cabin stands atop the cliffside amongst a few others, a lovely haven for those trying to escape from their humdrum every day. You can hear the water now, clamoring against rock with raucous desperation.

You make it to your cabin, a mostly barren, but elegant three-room bungalow with a small balcony jutting off toward the water. Your daughter rushes from room to room before collapsing on an easy chair bathed in light near the window. “Well, this is nice,” she squeaks.

You go over and sit on the arm of the chair. “You can see for miles, can’t you?” you ask, pulling her close to you.

She rests her head on your lap. “It’s so blue.”

“Very blue.”

“The bluest.”

“The bluest, you think? Go take a closer look.”

She hops up, reinvigorated. You wish you had that kind of recovery time. As she rushes toward the tall French doors that lead onto the balcony, John enters the cabin, finally. “Well, I’ll have to thank Peter,” he says, putting down the bags and taking a good look at the room. “I was worried we’d be walking into some ramshackle hovel.”

You laugh and look back out, seeing your daughter clutching at the balustrade on the balcony, looking out at the ocean. The room is now bathed in sea air, salt and sun, and you can hear the waves as clear as ever intermingling with gulls cawing boisterously.

John sidles up beside you, putting a hand on the nape of your neck. You watch her as she curiously peers through the bars, checking if it is indeed the bluest. It feels like the longest of moment of your life, in the best way. You look up at John who looks back at you and you smile. Sure, parenthood comes with its own struggles, but the occasions of clarity, of realizing that this is the best thing you had ever done and you did it together were worth it.

Your daughter turns around suddenly and declares, “It’s the bluest! I’ve decided.”

“You’ve decided, eh?” John prods, stalking toward her. “And who said you could decide?”

“I did!”

“You did?!” he repeats. He bends down to her, so their eyes are level. A staring contest, a standoff. Then, John reaches out and grabs her, lifting her into the air. She screams and laughs.

“Careful!” you call out, unable to keep yourself from smiling but nevertheless allowing your instinct for danger to kick in.

John turns around with her, now steady in his arms. She throws her arms around his neck. “I’m hungry,” she says, almost keening at the realization.

Your face falls. You just sat down.

“Well, we can’t have that,” he says. “We’ll go down and find something to eat.”

You rub your eyes and start to stand, but John shakes his head. “You’ll stay.”

"What?”

“You bury your nose in the book, you deserve some rest in the sun. You’ll come exploring tomorrow, hm?”

You object at first, but he insists. Your daughter also does so, eager to be in agreement with her father. “You stay and read, you deserve some rest,” she mimics with such genuine fortitude you almost feel like crying.

The two of them make haste to adventure and within the minute, they’re gone.

A body at rest stays at rest. You sit on the arm of the chair for a while, just staring out at the balcony. But enough is enough; you know inertia is not your friend. After all, it tried to stop you from this trip all together. You force yourself to stand, grab the book of Cummings poems, and go out onto the balcony.

Out on a chaise, in the sun, listening to the water, reading poetry, and relishing the salty air, you rest. Really rest.

You feel beautiful, in tune with the world and with your body. And it strikes you that you haven’t felt quite like that in a long time. The comfort of finding a lockstep again with the person you know you are is enough to lull you into a seaside slumber.


	3. for the rain

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Between parenthood and touring, you and your husband have grown distant, good roommates more than partners. When John suggests a weekend by the seaside to reconnect, you’re hesitant at first. After all, how much difference can the sea air really make?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> part iii – for the sunshine
> 
> "Such a pretty face for such an...indecent girl." 
> 
> 🎈happy birthday to sweet baby angel, John Paul Jones. let's celebrate with some smut🎈
> 
> nsfw/NSFW AS HELL/fluff and aftercare too   
> (#dirty talk #oralsex# exhibitionism #fingering #outdoorsex #blowjob #lotsoflaughingandfucking)

The next thing you know, you feel a hand on your shoulder, jostling you lightly.

“Y/N…”

You open your eyes to find John, sitting on the side of your chaise, and leaning over you. “Naps run in the family then, mm?” he teases.

It’s dusk. The world is blue and you see at the horizon the sun and ocean melting together. “God, what time is it?”

“Late,” he says.

You sit up quickly, stunned at yourself for losing so much of your day. Your book falls off your lap and onto the ground.

“Darling, slow down,” he says, grabbing the book before you can. John closes it and places it in your lap. “Everything is fine.”

“Is she – “

“She’s in bed, I just tucked her in.”

“I should go say goodnight.”

John puts a hand on your leg, right above your knee. “There’s no need; she was out once her head hit the pillow…you’re not missing anything.”

With your eyes adjusting now to the sky, you get a better look at your husband. His shirt is all mussed from a day of walking in the sun and his hair more windswept from the sea air – a rugged quality you don’t normally see at home.

You lean forward, pressing a hand to his chest, prodding one of the buttons on his shirt with your thumb. “Thank you. For today.”

“It was nothing,” John says and puts his arm around your waist. You sit hip to hip on the lounge, looking at each other in the blue dusk of the seaside. John cranes his head down to your shoulder, kissing it gently. “You cold?”

You shake your head. “No.”

“Are you sure? You’ve got goosebumps.”

“Keep me warm then,” you say, nestling your face into his neck. He laughs, wrapping his arms tighter around you. “How long have you been back?” you ask. As he speaks, you trace a finger down the contour of his jaw. You want to examine every bit of him with your fingers.

“An hour or so, now.”

“An hour already?”

John nods. 

“Did she eat?” Your finger settles briefly at the cleft in his chin.

“Oh, yes, she was ravenous.”

“Good.”

“You hungry? We brought something back for you.”

You shake your head. “Not now. Maybe later.” Despite not having anything since breakfast, you’re not. The anticipation of each fleeting moment has been enough to sustain you. “But…” you slide your hand down his side until you feel the boxy lump of a pack of cigarettes in his pocket. “I’ll take a cigarette.”

“I was wondering what you were doing with that wandering hand,” he says. His eyes roll up playfully. When he does this, he looks like a sweet, cheeky little boy.

“I can move my hand a few inches to the left, if you like,” you tease.

John practically cackles, “See, this is what I mean, ‘always coy’, full of shit.” Then, he reaches into his pocket and pulls out the pack, flipping open the top with his thumb. “A cigarette for dinner. You sound like a writer.”

You fish a cigarette out between your index and middle fingers. “Did you two have fun?”

“Of course,” he replies, his voice hoarse and low; you can only imagine both in an effort to be quiet and from the weariness of the day. He takes one for himself, returns the pack to his pocket, exchanging it for a matchbox. “She certainly kept me on my toes though. I feel like I must have walked a thousand miles today.”

He strikes the match. Snap. It sets aflame in a way you had never noticed, not all at once, although it’s quick enough to seem that way. John holds it up to the cigarette in your mouth. You breathe in, hearing the end of the cigarette hiss as it catches fire.

The smoke sears your lungs in a familiar way. You sigh, smoke flooding away from your mouth. You don’t smoke often anymore, ever since your daughter was born, but every now and then, it reminds you of the drama of the people you used to be. The absolute chaos of young and furious love.

“Now me, mm?” he says, putting the cigarette between his lips.

John leans forward, putting the end of his cigarette against yours and inhaling, waiting for his to alight. He concentrates, his brow knitting a moment, and his sunken cheeks dimpling, before retreating with his now lit cigarette. You both smoke in silence. A communion of sorts, with your breath starting to synchronize and the sound of the world around you taking hold.

John looks out over at the ocean. The corners of his eyes relax and then he looks back to you. “Been awhile since we shared a cigarette, hm?” he says, his eyebrows raised. 

“Too long.” You take another puff and then lay back on the chaise, letting your eyes meander across the starlit sky. 

John bristles at you going further away and slides up the chaise to be closer to you. “Smoke suits you,” he says, taking a long drag on his cigarette.

“You too.”

“I look better behind a bit of a smokescreen, hm?”

You reach out and pinch his arm. “No, you moron, you look just as pretty.” 

“Pretty, hm?” John grins. “It’s the hair isn’t it?”

His self-deprecation, while charming on occasion, can be frustrating. When you stare at the man before you, especially in his moments of concentration, you almost swear he’s been carved from marble. The elegant and quiet angularity of him, which you missed upon first glance years ago, is something you can’t resist watching now.

“Are you tired?” you ask.

A curious smirk peels across his lips. John says softly, “No, I’m not tired.” Then he takes a drag on his cigarette, his lips curling around the filter with an adept gentleness. With smoke floating from his mouth, he asks, “Are you?”

You answer all too quickly, “No, I’m wide awake.”

"Good.”

Your eyes meet in the dark – you wonder if this is the moment that all the anticipation bursts. But you’re not ready, not yet. You want to tease it out a little longer.

You get up from the lounge. John reaches out and touches your dress, an encouragement for you to stay, but you continue on with your game of cat and mouse. You walk to the balustrade and lean on the railing, looking out at the sea before you, miles and miles and miles. The bluest, even in the dark. The sun has dipped entirely below the horizon and the moon has taken over its former radiance. “Beautiful view, isn’t it?” 

“Yes, a very beautiful view,” he says in your wake.

You feel his eyes on you. You wonder which part of you he’s looking at. In your years of intimacy, you know all the small parts of you he’s taken a shine to: the softness of your calves or the slightness of your ankles, the curve of your waist, the way your hair catches on your shoulders. You hear him breathe in sharply and you turn just in time to see him readjust the crotch of his pants. He looks at the ground, letting out an uncomfortable laugh. “The things you do to me, Y/N.”

You shrug. “I haven’t done anything.”

He clicks his tongue at your impetuousness and rolls his eyes. “You don’t have to do anything.” He takes one more drag of the cigarette before dropping it and stamping it out under his shoe. “You just have to stand there.” He pauses. His eyes intently on you. “Just your silhouette there in the dark.”

He stands. “And your hair all tangled from your nap.”

“My best look, of course,” you reply, tousling your hair playfully.

“It’s more lovely than you know.” John closes the space between the two of you with slow, purposeful steps. He stops just short of being close enough to wrap him in your arms and beg him to devour every bit of you. You both stand there, a foot apart, his hands in his pockets, and you leant up against the railing.

You restrain yourself.

“It simply isn’t fair,” he says. 

You cast your eyes down to the bulge in his pants again and smile. You take another drag of the cigarette and then drop it, used up almost all the way to the filter. “I can help you with that, you know.” 

John’s breath catches a moment. He hesitates before saying deliberately, “I’m sure you could, if you wanted to.”

“I do. Very much.” 

The blueness of the night echoes around you. The moon, the stars, the trail of the now departed sun. And your eyes caught in one another’s, unable to look away. The night air throbs and pulsates, sea air compounding your anticipation. This is the moment.

“Come closer,” you say.

John smiles and does as you say, stepping toward you, still mocking you with a bit of distance. You just want him pressed up against you, almost fused to you, if you could. You’re not ready to beg, though.

“Better?” he asks. And you nod even though you want to say, Closer.  
Your heart starts to beat wildly. He reaches out and touches your neck; his calloused fingertips against your skin make you shiver. With a restrained purpose, John kisses you. A long, desirous kiss. You put your hands against his chest, fiddling with the top button of his shirt again. He draws back. The urgency within you mellows when you realize that you have lost at your own game and John is now in control of the board. You can see it in his eyes, that he knows that he’s thrown you off balance.

You almost despise how much you want him, which only makes you want him more.

John drags his fingers down your neck to your collarbone, over your breasts, and down to your waist. His eyes flick back up to yours.

“Will you turn around for me, darling?” John asks, almost harmlessly, if you didn’t know better.

You nod and follow his direction. While you’ve known John for years now (and known him intimately many, many times over), you never know what to expect at this juncture. His versatility spans all parts of his life and his sexual proclivity is no different.

“Good girl.”

God, you start to go weak. That’s all it takes.

John hums to himself a moment, admiring your form. Then, his hand snakes around one of your hips and he presses himself to your backside. You feel the fullness of him, the unyielding hardness of his erection. Your stomach flutters. He groans in your ear and pushes his face into the crook of your neck.

Your body alights. You’re now terribly aware of how wet you are. “John…” his name escapes your lips.

“I’ve been waiting all day for you,” he says breathlessly, his other hand making its way under your breasts and drawing you even tighter to him.

You roll your hips back into him. “Fuck, Y/N…” He grabs at your skirt, pulling it up as he did on the train, although now there is no reservation, just a primal anxiety. With his hand now between your legs, he brushes his fingers against the outside of your underwear. “Oh, you are soaked, aren’t you?”

“Drenched,” you say. You look over your shoulder and up into his face. His eyes are hungry.

You’re both so hungry. 

“God, what am I to do with you?” His words land against your face, his breath growing heavier with each moment.

“Whatever you want.”

He sighs. “Whatever…” his fingers travel to the waistband of your underwear and slowly creep inside, “Whatever I want.”

“Whatever you want,” you repeat, almost soundlessly.

With your eyes locked in one another’s, John smiles slightly as slides his fingers between your lower lips. “So wet, darling.” He teases your opening a moment, occasionally skimming your clit, reveling in the state he’s put you in.

You moan as the sensation traveling up through your middle. He doesn’t linger long though before slipping a finger inside of you. Your breath hitches and all words escape you. 

One finger, then two, John indulges you, enjoying your whines. You feel your knees weaken and your brain go numb to decision. You lean forward to catch yourself on the balustrade, but John’s fingers seize deeper inside you. He holds you tightly against him with his other hand, your back flush against his chest. You cry out at the ecstatic sensation of fullness between your legs, throwing your head back over his shoulder in tender.

“Oh, you’re frantic, you poor thing,” he whispers.

You press your lips together, his fingers prodding you in just the right spot. But you’re not ready to give into him fully. You turn your head toward him, taking deep breaths to overcome the excitement between your legs. “You’re enjoying making me suffer.”

“Suffer? The sounds you’re making aren’t suffering,” he chuckles. His fingers seize again and you shriek with delight. He covers your mouth with his hand. “Careful. You’ll wake her.”

You couldn’t care less about that in this moment. You reach back and touch his throbbing member through his trousers. John gasps, his grip loosening on you a moment long enough for you to free yourself. You turn back to him and hook your fingers over his waistband. “Don’t let me have all the fun,” you say and then lean for an anxious, deep kiss.

Your tongues intertwine violently. While you entertain his lips, you’re able to his trousers so they sit loosely on his hips. You don’t take yourself for much of a multitasker in everyday life, but when it comes to your intimacy, you could be considered a pro. Now, you’re able to reach inside much easier, brushing the skin of his cock with your fingers, so sensitive that he lets out a helpless whimper. You pull your face back from him, even though he trails after you, wanting nothing more than to continue this battle. “Sit down on the lounge.”

“What?” he’s in such a daze already from you, he can’t seem to process what you’re asking.

You let out a laugh and start to push him back toward the chaise, an almost fumbling dance. “John, sit down so I can do something about this,” you say, wrapping your hand as best you can around his stiffness.

“Oh, my god,” he mutters. Then, his eyes, fly up into yours. They are almost overwrought with desire, his usually heavy lids now wide.

The chaise bumps against the back of John’s leg. “Sit down!” you say again, giggling at his hazy absurdity.

“Alright, alright, I’m sitting, I’ll sit!” he titters. He follows your instruction, finally, and perches at the edge of the chaise.

You smile and kneel before him. “Are you nervous?” you ask.

“What?” he asks incredulously. You slide your hands against the inside of his thighs and push his legs apart so you can nestle in between them. “No, I’m not nervous.” 

“Really? Because you’re talking an awful lot,” you smirk, shirking his pants down further so that you can easily free his cock.

“Am I? A lot? Really?”

“You’re running your mouth like your life depends on it, John.”

“I guess, ha, I don’t know, I like when you – “

“You like when I…” you interrupt. With his cock now free from all constraint, you are free to admire it as you please. You hold his cock in your hand and brush your thumb delicately across the tip, already wet with precum.

He shivers involuntarily, “Oh fuck.”

You both laugh. “Well, you’re an easy case,” you say, running your hand up and down his erection. Only gently, only a tease.

John trains his eyes on your hand before he takes a deep breath and replies, “I like when you demand.”

“Oh,” you say, your lips now perfectly poised to wrap around the tip of his cock. You slip it into your mouth, ever so gently tightening your lips around his shaft.

A guttural groan escapes him. He braces himself with his hands behind him on the chaise.

You hum sweetly as you start to bob your head up and down. Your tongue explores him, tongue skimming the tip or following the trail of a prominent vein. You’ve always loved his cock; it suits him. More importantly, it suits you, very well.

You wrap your hands around John’s thighs and get a good grip on him, before taking him as deep as you can into your mouth. He shudders. “Christ, Y/N,” he manages to say. You raise your gaze up to him, watching him watching you. Off-guard, is the best way to describe him, his hair chaotically in his eyes and his mouth dumbly agape as he watches you work on him. All you can do is smile a bit. For such a thoughtful and cautious person, you adore the moments he is unhinged.

You get lost in your work again. Each sigh and whimper you relish with giddiness, changing tempo and intensity on him with ease. You grow wetter; the effect you have on him is almost as gratifying as being pleasured yourself, but no replacement.

Again, you take him deep into your mouth, the tip of his cock hitting the back of your throat. John’s breath catches and his thighs tighten around you. Before you can continue, you feel his hand on your shoulder, fingers grasping at the collar of your dress. “Y/N, wait,” he says gruffly.

You reluctantly release him from your mouth to your hand. “Something wrong?” you ask.

“No, not at all, just – ”

“Do you want me to stop?”

He looks down his torso to you, breathing heavily. He attempts a smile, “You’re doing brilliantly, but –”

You burst out laughing at his assessment. “But?”

John half-laughs with you and he shakes his head. “Um…” He takes a finger and runs it along your lower lip that’s still slick with saliva. “I just want to kiss you now. Is that alright?”

You know you’re blushing; you can just feel your cheeks getting hot. Very like him to want to interrupt a moment like this with such a pure request, comparatively. You rise up on your knees, closing distance between you. You nod, “Yes, John.” 

John brushes your hair from your face, both his hands trying to rearrange your now haphazard locks into something more manageable. “There you are,” he says. He cradles your head in both of his wide palmed hands. He’s scanning your face with his eyes. “Such a beautiful face for such an…indecent girl.”

“Doesn’t my face still look beautiful with your cock in my mouth?” you spar back.

“Oh, of course. The beauty and the indecency are not at all mutually exclusive.” Always quick with the tongue when he has his wits about him.

The moment lulls between the two of you, but not silent, no – you’re reminded of the sea just behind you. The waves are louder now, a soft breeze to the air.

John leans in close to you. “Just to be perfectly clear,” he says, his voice soft and wanting. “You were doing a really fantastic job down there.”

“Oh, thank you, I’ll write home about it.” You tilt your head back in submission to him.

“Everyone will be so proud, I’m sure,” he grins.

You expect him to start again on what you two had started while standing, the aggressive bantering between your lips. But instead, John kisses you on your forehead, your temple, then your cheek, and finally, lands tenderly on your lips again. It’s this, the ebb and flow between passion and restrain, that makes you wild. So, while he settles into a slower state, you can barely contain yourself. The closeness to him again thrills you. You throw your arms around his neck, not wanting to let him get away.

John’s perceptive, always has been, and attunes to your energy with ease. He draws his lips away from yours, ever so slightly; they’re almost like ghosts against yours. “Come here,” he says, a roughness now to his voice.

What follows is some sort of special chaos. His hands fly from your face to your ass, grasping at every bit he can. One of his hands slides to your thigh and, with grace only John could have, he pulls you up off the ground and onto his lap. His fingers dig into your soft curves.

You gasp. “You don’t stay sweet for long, do you?”

John presses his mouth against your neck; you can feel his words resound against you. “I can be as sweet as you like me to be, but we both know that’s not what you want now, is it?”

You shake your head, even though he can’t see you. John sucks on the soft skin of your neck, his teeth abrading you, a pleasant burn. You grab tightly to the back of his head, giving his hair a tug. He growls and looks back up at you. Teeth bared in some new mania. He reaches up to the sleeves of your dress. “You know what that does to me.”

“Do I?” you ask, dumbly batting your eyelashes.

A dark sort of laughter peels from his mouth. He yanks the sleeves of your dress down, the top button popping off in fury. You curse out of shock and exhilaration. Your breasts spill over the fabric that is trying to cling to its former shape. 

Not a moment too soon, John takes both of your breasts in his hand, caressing their fullness. He draws his lips down from your collarbone to your right breast. With your eyes now attuned to the darkness, completely, as if you were made for it, you watch his lips puckering. How his fingers make impressions in your soft curves, like lines in the sand that will be gone as soon as they’ve arrived. You can see the minute shifts of his skin as his tongue traces hypnotic patterns across your nipple. 

You feel his cock stiffening again between your legs and you begin to rock against him. John lets out a moan against your breast, shaking your sternum. His eyes curl up to yours while his heavy lids bow. As if to offer you your turn out of fairness. You put a hand around the back of his head, weaving your fingers in and out of his hair, and lean back, leveraging yourself to grind against him harder than before.

John’s mouth leaves your breast and he swears, “Fuck. Fuck.” He starts to laugh.

“You want to be inside me, don’t you?” you ask, continuing to rock your hips against his swollen cock.

“No, of course not,” he tries to joke, but is cut short with a groan he can’t hold in when you press your hips harder to his. “Oh, my fucking life, what are you doing to me?”

You stop and close in on him again, lowering your mouth to his ear. “I want you inside me.”

John sighs. He puts his forehead against your chest.

“I’ve never wanted anything more,” you whisper. 

You hear him call out for god against your bare breasts.

“Please.”

You are both are still, except for John’s breathing, which is ragged. You feel his hand move to your thigh. His fingers press into your skin, harder. You almost hope he leaves a mark. “Say it again.”

“Please.”

His other hand slinks up your back. “Please, what?”

“Please, fuck me, John.”

And those are your magic words because, suddenly, you’re on your back on the chaise and John is standing above you, between your legs.

John crawls onto the chaise, reaches up under your skirt, and starts to tug down on your underwear. “Let’s get these off, hm?”

“Yes, please,” you answer, a devilish grin spreading across your face. Your cheeks burn, you’re smiling so hard. You assist him, twisting your legs to help him remove your underwear as quickly as possible, although in the state you’re in, it couldn’t be quick enough. Then, to match you, he steps out of his trousers, completely naked from the waist down. You feel like a teenager again, when sex was still new to you and your desperation didn’t even allow for time to get all your clothes off.

John returns, hovering over you, closer than before. He pulls the hem of your dress up to your waist, revealing your entire self to the sea air. He admires you a moment and then looks up to your face, “You’re so beautiful.”

“Oh,” you blush.

“So beautiful, my god,” he says, his eyes traveling back down to your sex. He wraps his hand around his cock and strokes it slowly, reinvigorating himself. “Every fucking part of you.” John touches your lower lips, pushing them gently apart with his thumb and feeling how wet you are again. You let out a stuttering breath.

John’s eyes briefly flit up to yours and then soften, as they settle on your pink center. He draws his hand away and licks your juice off his thumb. A tight-lipped smile appears on his face.

You reach up, tangling your fingers in the fabric of his shirt, beckoning him to you. His body sinks onto yours and you can feel his bare cock at your center, poised to enter you if only with a little guidance.

Your noses graze one another’s, so close it feels like you’re exchanging the same breath back and forth. You slide one hand down between the two of you and find his cock, now sticky with your juice. You hear him swallow.

You tilt your hips toward him, finding the perfect angle, and then, place him at your entrance.

John shifts forward, slipping the tip of his cock inside you carefully. He lets out a small groan. Then, he continues to push forward, each inch of him stretching you. It’s been so long since you’ve had him inside you, you sharply inhale and bite your lip, slight discomfort intermingling with the euphoria of finally having your hunger met. 

“You alright?” he asks as best he can. You can tell he’s trying to hold his composure.

You nod. “Yes, yes, just –” You dig your nails into his back and push your hips up to his, helping him sink deeper into you. “Just fuck me.”

John huffs in pleasure, “You don’t have to tell me twice,” and he begins to thrust into you over and over, finding a rhythm that suits you both. Warmth starts to pool out into every part of your body, your core igniting and melting away any discomfort. “Y/N…” he sighs your name, as if it’s the only word he can hang onto.

The heat you feel from his constant pulsing into you and the irresistible, tickling itch you need scratched make your brain start to go numb. Your legs start to shake. You pull them as tight as you can around his hips, bringing his entire length inside you, all the way to his hilt. He swears. He continues to thrust, but you’re keeping him so close, he can only make short and frantic strokes into you. He starts shaking too.

“You’re driving me mad,” he chokes out.

You could say the same of him, if you had any power to form words rather than uncontrolled whimpers. Your hands have gone limp and fall from him. He’s bringing you so close, to something, his cock hitting a deep and unrelenting point of pleasure in you. You put your index finger in your mouth and bite your knuckle to keep from being too loud.

John wraps his arms around you and manages to pull almost entirely out of you before thrusting his cock back in, every inch. You can’t take it; your body heaves forward despite yourself, your face smashing into his shoulder, and you let out a wail. Just to be full of him. You feel like you could start weeping, the feelings building in your center without rest, and your hips bucking wildly.

“John,” you cry out his name again and again into his shoulder. You need him to keep going and also need a rest. 

Breathlessly, he tries to get a word in, “If you keep saying my name like that, I won’t last long.”

“Oh, I don’t care, I don’t care, I don’t care,” you moan. You’ve given up being quiet. Your head lolls back and you stare at the sky. You’d almost forgotten that you were out in the open like this. That only makes you enjoy it more.

“I do. I’m not done yet,” he says, his wits now about him.

John slides out of you without warning and you let out a squeal of complaint. He silences you with a kiss. He breaks away and shakes his head, “You sound like you’re being exorcised.”

You laugh loudly despite yourself. “Feels like it too.”

“That’s a good thing, I hope,” John smirks. He kisses you again, a small one, that sets off a cascade of kisses that trail down your neck, back over your breasts (where he lingers again on your nipples), and to your stomach.

John pulls back, finding his bearing as he kneels on the ground and folds his torso over the chaise toward you. He hooks his hands under your thighs. His nose brushes against your knee as he moves to press a kiss to the inside of your thigh.

You feel your toes start to uncurl. You’ve been so tensely wound. You know he’s trying to get you to relax and give in, let him give you a pleasurable respite.

John continues the kisses down your thigh until he’s lingering right over your center. He inhales your scent deeply and rests his cheek against the inside of your leg, his eyes fluttering shut in intoxication. “I could stay here forever.”

“Wouldn’t it be nice?” you whisper and sweep your hand through his hair. 

A sigh. What a life it would be, to keep him there between his legs. You both descend into your own fantasy of that, if only for a moment. And then, he jerks you down toward him and rolls his head back to your middle and puts his lips against your aching and tender clit. You cry out, something between a screech and a laugh. Your eyes go wide.

John hums into your lower lips, clearly pleased with himself, his tongue dancing in and out of you. You want to watch him make work of you, so you prop yourself up on your elbows. He looks so pretty between your legs, like a painting almost, the way his brow creates crescents of shadow over his eyes and his long hair spills across your legs. And how could you forget his rosy, swollen lips against you.

His blue eyes slowly open. You catch them in yours. He presses his mouth harder against you, rumbling in his own pleasure. In control.  
You don’t have long to admire him before he’s trapped you just right in his mouth, a new part of you activating in your core. Your stomach muscles start to tremble. “Oh my god, John,” you moan, lingering on the ‘n’ at the end of his name.

Your arms give out and you collapse back onto the chaise. You hook your legs around his shoulders and in turn, he slides his hands further under you, clutching at your lower back. You feel the warmth returning. It has a different quality, rounded at the edges and now concentrated between your legs. Back arching, toes curling, hands grasping at the chaise, you can’t help yourself from a trembling moan.

“John, I’m…I’m so close,” you whimper. The wave of pleasure you are on keeps seeming to crest, but each time you think you’ll spill over, it keeps going.

John tears his mouth away and shakes his head, “Not yet.”

With all the speed he can muster, he’s back on the chaise and plunges his cock into you, thrusting again. You shriek, grabbing onto his shoulders.

He doesn’t have to do much. The wave comes crashing down and your entire body spasms. You cry out his name and you hear him coo into your ear, “That’s it, darling.”

You’re bathed in euphoria, a glowing heat ripping across your body. Leg shaking, heart racing, you feel yourself contracting around his cock; the tightness makes John curse. He continues to pump into you as the orgasm echoes around your body.

You tuck your hands on his thighs, right below his ass, pushing him into you fully again. Between shuddering breaths and the weakening waves of your pleasure, you say to John, “I’m all yours.”

John grunts, just on the precipice of release.

“Cum for me, John.”

It takes a few more strokes from him before he bursts inside you. John exhales sharply, his jaw slackening and his eyes rolling back into his head briefly. Your name is the first word he reaches for as his head droops down into your neck. He presses himself tightly there and lets out a strident cry, the loudest he’s been all evening. You can feel his cock stuttering with orgasm, filling you with every last bit of his seed. The heat of him reignites the twilight of your pleasure and final moan hiccups out of you simultaneously with his groans.

You both lie there, him still inside you, heaving breaths together. You stare into the night sky and reach around his head, cradling him there to you. “Are you alright?” you ask.

John nods. Not ready for words and still trying to catch his breath.

You can feel how damp his shirt has gotten and the sweat on his brow that his pressed against your jaw. You kiss the crown of his head. The world around you suddenly feels so large. The expanse of the ocean, you can feel just by lying here in your post-coital repose. You remember your daughter, asleep inside the cottage. The train ride, the cliffsides and the wildflowers. Your home. The organ. Your library. The garden.

He starts to slide out of you. “Don’t go,” you plead, pushing your fingers into his back. You’re not ready. 

“I won’t, I won’t…” he whispers back, retreating back to you. He kisses you on the jaw. “I won’t, I’m here.”

You feel tears brimming at your eyes, both from the relief of all your pent-up lust and the immediacy of John’s heartbeat steadying against you. The thought of your bodies fusing together no longer feels so impossible as you lie here. You never want him to leave. Never leave your body, never leave home again. In this moment, you want to change your mind. Spend every night of your life like this. Stay home forever.  
Your tears abate when a voice in your head reminds you it could never last. Not every night would be a night like this. Out on the balcony, by the sea.

A body at rest stays at rest. And a body in motion stays in motion. You are the rest and he is the motion. You cannot change that.

John lifts his head as if it’s heavy as a boulder and interrupts your racing thoughts, “I guess we’re exhibitionists now.”

A welcome, light-hearted pause in your existential dread. You look around at the empty world around you. “For a couple of seagulls, maybe.”

“Lucky seagulls.”

You wonder what he was thinking in the silence you shared. 

“Alright, I’ve overstayed my welcome, mm?” he teases. He slides out of you carefully and twists onto his side to fit on the chaise next to you, leaning on his elbow.

He hasn’t overstayed. The emptiness ricochets through your body. All you have is the feeling of his cum still warm inside you.

John puts a hand against your ribcage, feeling your breath slowing. You get a good look at his face again, at peace, no longer manacled by lust. In its wake, his sweet smile, his cheeks dimpling. Cocky bastard. “You’ve ruined my dress,” you say.

“Yes, I suppose I did, didn’t I?” a grin spreads across his face. His gaze travel down your body again, from the chaos he left of your dress, to the space between your legs where his seed drips slowly from you. You can tell he’s pleased. He tenderly pulls down the hem of your dress to cover your lower half. “We’ll have to clean you up.”

“In a bit,” you sigh and nestle your face into his arm.

He finds a lock of your hair and starts to twist it around his finger. “Aren’t you sweet, then?”

“Sometimes.”

“That’s true, sometimes. Other times you’re an absolute demon.”

You smirk, “I’ll take that as a compliment.”

“It is, absolutely. I’ll gladly exorcise you again and again.”

You giggle. You feel like you could fall into another sleep, swaddled in his arms and the cloak of the night. The ocean, a complimenting lullaby.

From the silence fallen between you, John clears his throat and asks you in a now sort of grave voice, “Y/N, can I tell you something?”

You pull away to get a better look at him. His brow is now furrowed and there is a tightness in his jaw. It almost looks as if he’s chewing on the inside of his cheek. “What is it?”

“Uh. Well, I’ve been thinking. About, well, about everything, really. And I’ve come to the realization that, more than anything in the world, I want to make you happy. And I don’t think I’ve been doing a very good job of that while I’ve been away,” he says. He’s searching your face to see if you understand.

You’re not sure you do. “John, I don’t want you to stop touring or –“

“No, I know you don’t, it’s – that’s not what I mean, what I mean is…” he falters. You can’t tell if words are escaping him or he’s too afraid to say what’s on his mind.

You sit up, resituating the bodice of your dress, suddenly feeling exposed. Not knowing what he is going to say next doesn’t sit well with you. “John?” 

He takes your hand, clutching it tightly. “I’m sorry if you’ve ever felt far from my mind. You’re not. Ever. Ever,” John says, the tenseness in his face falling away. His eyes bear into yours, scoring his words into your brain. Impossibly clear. Not ever far from his mind.  
You feel the corners of your mouth perk up in a small smile. At home, alone with your daughter, you sometimes wonder in the raucousness of touring how much time he even has to think of, remember his life with you.

You realize in this moment why the past few months you’ve surrendered to your inertia. You’ve been grieving being remembered.

And even though you’re smiling, even though he’s said the exact right thing, the tears spill forth, the ones you had held back as you laid together.

John rushes to you, pulling you tight as possible to him. You sob in to his shoulder. He hushes you tenderly. “I’ve got you. I’ve got you, darling,” he coos and buries his face in your hair. “I didn’t mean to make you cry. I’m sorry.”

“No,” you say through hiccupping breaths. “No, I – I needed to hear that.”

“You shouldn’t need to hear it, I should be better at telling you,” he says firmly. “Look at me, Y/N.”

You do. John’s eyes are desperately earnest. “I love you. I don’t want you to forget that.”

It’s like a vow. And with the stars, the night, and the sea as witnesses, you echo is words back to him. You mean it. You mean it with everything in you. Now, you feel your hunger you’ve felt since this morning sated. More tears bud in your eyes. “Oh god,” you laugh as the tears spill out. You hide your face in your hands and turn away from him. “I’m sorry, I can’t seem to stop crying.”

He clicks his tongue and puts his arms around his waist. “Don’t be silly.” He kisses the back of your neck.

You shake your head. “No, but we just – you know, that was really great and I don’t want to ruin it with all –“

“You’re not ruining anything, Y/N. Are you kidding?” John scoffs. “Are you joking?” He kisses the back of your neck. “That was – I mean, I certainly enjoyed myself. And, while I’m not one to assume, I have pretty good feeling you did too.” 

You laugh and lean against him. Your tears start to subside. “I did, I did.” 

“So,” he puts his fingers around your chin gently. “Not ruined.” 

“Not ruined,” you repeat before he kisses you ever so gingerly. 

“Now if you weren’t hungry before, I’m sure you are now, mm?” he asks and disentangles from you. 

Not in the way you were before. But certainly, in the way he means. Voraciously. “I’m starving.” 

He puts his trousers back on and goes to the French doors. You start to follow him, feeling the ache in your thighs already starting to set in. “Wow, you’ve really destroyed me, John,” you laugh.

John’s eyes twinkle amusedly as he waits for you, a hand on his hip. “I can tell, I’m worried you won’t make it in before sunrise at the rate you’re walking.”

“I can tell. I’m worried you won’t make it in before sunrise at the rate you’re walking.”

“John!” you gasp.

“It’s charming, really.”

You make it to him. “You are bad,” you stick your finger in his side.

“Seems to suit you just fine,” John smiles and opens the door for you. “Now, you go get cleaned up and meet me back out here. I’ll have something ready for you.”

Before you enter, you kiss him on the cheek, letting your lips linger there. “You’re never far from my mind either,” you say quietly.

John flushes, adding to his disarray in the purest way possible.

You go to clean up as quickly as you can and change into your nightgown. You don’t want to be away from him too long. Before you leave your room, you run your hairbrush through your hair, attempting to work through some of the knots that your lovemaking formed. One…two…three.  
You pause. The mirror catches your eye. Looking at yourself, the first thing you notice are the childish scrapes on your neck from John’s teeth. How embarrassing (but you secretly love them). You notice a new color to your skin, a glow, like the fire you felt inside has somehow manifested itself outward. Your shoulders are lower. You feel like you’re standing taller.

“Y/N…” you hear John call out quietly from the other room.

You make eye contact with your reflection. You wonder what life is like for her on the other side of the looking glass. You wonder if she would want to switch places with you. You smile.

You know you wouldn’t want to switch places with her.


	4. lady nature

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Between parenthood and touring, you and your husband have grown distant, good roommates more than partners. When John suggests a weekend by the seaside to reconnect, you’re hesitant at first. After all, how much difference can the sea air really make?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> part iv - lady nature
> 
> “You said you want to go slow. Do you want me to keep you honest?”
> 
> nsfw again, i couldn't help it (fluff and some aftercare included)  
> (#morningsex #dirtytalk #spooning #withholding-ish)
> 
> I’ve really appreciated all the love and encouragement y’all have given me and connections we have made through my journey back into fanfic, especially with our sweet baby angel, Jonesy. I had to send off this fic in the best way I knew how: smutty, fluffy, and lots of teasing. Enjoy!

The next morning, dawn sneaks in through the sheer white curtains of your room. You have been awake about fifteen minutes, the combination of a bed that is not your own and the light proving too much to continue your slumber. You know it can’t be that late yet, perhaps only 6, but you are excited for the day ahead, to join the adventuring and see what the seaside has to offer. You daydream as you stare at the light strewn window. With your focus attuned, you can hear the sea again, lapping at the cliffside. 

It calls out to you, begs for your attention. You debate getting out of bed, perhaps grabbing a book and reading on the balcony. Or finding a scrap of paper somewhere and write like you used to. You stick one of your feet out from under the covers and feel the welcomed coolness of the air.

But John sleepily wraps his arms around you, spooning you from behind; it’s almost as if he could read your thoughts, that you’ve deigned to think about escaping the bed. He presses his face to the back of your neck and inhales deeply, his body tensing as he consumes your morning scent, and then releasing.

You can feel him, his cock semi-hard, aching at your back.

“Good morning, John,” you say wryly, reaching back to stroke his face.

He doesn’t get your meaning, still lost in the place between sleep and waking. “Morning, darling,” he croaks.

The night before, after the two of you had crawled into bed in your nightclothes and found a comfortable position to be as close as possible, you found yourselves descending again into a fitful passion. You didn’t consummate it fully, at least not like you had on the balcony, but your clothes came off, and your hands roamed around each other until neither of you could keep your eyes open any longer. 

You lay there, falling in and out of sleep for another ten minutes with John’s arms entangled around you. You’re then roused again by him saying your name.

“You awake?” he asks.

“Yes.”

“You’re not getting up yet, are you?” John asks.

“Thinking about it.”

“No, no, no,” he tuts “It’s much too early for thinking.” One of his hands traces your sternum all the way to your belly, before diverting to your waist and caressing the softness of your hip, the thickness you sometimes pinch in the mirror.

“Y/N,” he calls again, a lilt to his voice.

“Mmm, yes John?” You turn your head back toward him and he meets you with a kiss, lazy at first, but you can feel he has the intent to keep you there as long as he can, coaxing your lips apart more and more.

Time is at the back of your mind; life doesn’t wait for your intimacy like it used to. You’re able to break away from him briefly, “John, she could be up any moment.” 

“It’s only a kiss.”

You scoff, “Heard that before.”

A low laugh travels up from his middle. “Sounds like you don’t trust me.”

“It’s not a matter of trust.” You reach your hand back into his web of hair and bring his lips to yours again and, after not much time, you feel his full erection pressing against your back. You pull away, giving him a reproachfully teasing look. “It’s a matter of predictability.”

“You started it that time,” John mumbles with only vague embarrassment. He resituates his body so his cock is teasing at the back of your thighs and his hand presses into the ampleness of your backside.

In the mornings, you love how sex is like warm water trickling out of the tap, steady and simple and slow. It’s that ease of desire that makes you to part your thighs and allow John to den himself there.

“It seems I’m not the only predictable one,” he says. He mocks you, running his cock back and forth through your wet opening.

You start to ache, the pleasing lightness between your legs that only wants more, never less. “Oh, that feels…so nice,” you whine.

John puts his hand against your lower ribs and pauses a moment. “Can I make love to you, darling?” he asks with his lips against your ear.

The term ‘make love’ always made you gag before meeting John. When you were young, the friction you wanted to feel between your legs and the way you wished to be pressed down against the bed eluded the phrase entirely. But you were young (younger) and things had changed when you met him. At least the first time he had said such a thing to you, years ago, on what could have been a sad winter night, you didn’t bristle. Instead, you had let him.

“Please,” you reply.

You feel his lips break into a smile on the back of your neck. “I’ll be quick, I promise.”

“You always say that and then – “

“Wouldn’t you prefer me to exaggerate how quick I’ll be than how long I last?” John whispers.

You shake your head with a laugh because, of course, he’s right. “You’re incorrigible.”

The two of you shift your bodies, unhurriedly finding him passage inside of you. You whimper softly. In kind, he lets out a heavy breath that spills down your back.

No words, at first. Just breath and the slick sounds of your bodies interlocking.

His strokes are almost without purpose, no goal but to be snugly fit inside you. His free hand meanders across your front; from the fullness of your breasts to the wiry hair over your labia now engulfing him to the smoothness of your thighs. His exploration is coupled with playful humming as he toys with each part of you.

The throbbing sensation builds up your front and it takes some amount of willpower not to groan. You reach your free arm down John’s side and press your hand against his ass, tracing the pads of your fingers against his tensing muscles.

Inspired by your touch, John’s languid strokes fall into a more determined rhythm and his wandering hand clutches at your stomach. Each thrust aligns with his quiet breathing until, despite himself, a loud moan escapes him. 

“John!” you hiss.

Almost simultaneously, he halts his thrusting, grabbing tightly onto you, and murmuring into the nape of your neck, “Sorry, sorry, I couldn’t help myself.”

“Well, try your best if you want to avoid being rudely interrupted,” you laugh.

John starts again, ever so slowly. Before long, though, he stops again and heaves a sigh. “You’re just so tight, I can’t…” His voice is gripped with frenzy he isn’t releasing. John does this, withholds from himself. It’s more fun than when you withhold from him. You know there’s something inevitable and volatile he wants to release and it’s up to you to tease it out of him.

You tense around him a moment and he huffs, “That’s not fair.”

“Couldn’t help it,” you say. You slip your fingers gently through the hair on his thigh. “What do you want? What can I give you?” 

With some exertion, he replies, “I just want to – I want to go slow for you.”

“You don’t have to go slow.”

“I want to go slow,” he says sternly, not for you, but for him. He is demanding slowness from himself.

You know it’s your job to make him fail.

As John gains his bearings, you start to pulse your hips against him. He lets you take the lead and roots his hand on your hip bone. Just easy, nothing serious or meaningful. At least to start.

With his senses more intact, his hand slides back up to your breast. You put your hand on his, haunting his fingers as they twist and pinch your sensitive nipple. Pleasure reverberates from your core and up to your lips that part in a long sigh. John presses a kiss against your cheek and keeps his face up against yours.

“God, your hands…” you say, words rumbling from your core.

John spreads his palm against your chest. “What about them?”

“Don’t act like you don’t know.”

"Remind me.” He takes your earlobe between his teeth and pulls.

You shiver. “You said you want to go slow. Do you want me to keep you honest?”

“Do your best.”

You smile. He’s asking for his own demise. You turn your head and find his lips for a small kiss. It lingers. So much anticipation and care behind it. When you draw away, you whisper, “All it takes is one touch and I’m wet. I don’t know how else to explain it, John.”

“Try,” he pleads and begins to trail kisses along the contour of your shoulder. Tell me what it is. Remind me what I do to you.

“Well…” you begin, rolling your hips more firmly against him. “When you touch me, I know that my body was made for you alone.”

His resistance starts to shrink as he rocks with you.

“That each curve and angle of my body was made for your hands to touch,” you say, toying with his long fingers. “That my lips were made only for you to kiss.” A smirk peels across your face. “Or to be wrapped around your cock.”

John is taken aback, masking the labor of his breath with a laugh.

Even though you feel your pleasure mounting, compounding within you, you’re able to keep a clear head as you zero in on pushing him over the edge. Your words and ideas are coming quickly and sharply. “And, naturally, you fit perfectly inside me.”

John murmurs your name.

“It’s how I know my body belongs to you.” 

He presses his sweated brow against your neck and mewls, trying to pull out of you. “Stop, stop, I can’t –“

"Why? Why, no, don’t – “

“I can’t control myself, right now.”

“So don’t.” 

“Y/N, Y/N, please –“

“Don’t be a martyr,” you say, forcing yourself back onto his cock.

John grunts at his sudden reentry. “God, you’re so cruel.” 

Your hips take over for your words, your core vibrating with primal urgency. You don’t have to think; you couldn’t if you wanted to. You feel feverish, desperate just for him to fill you again with his seed. You exhaust yourself quickly and, even though you desperately want to muscle through, you have to stop at catch your breath.

John runs his hand across your forehead, pushing some sweat laden hair away from your eyes. “Fuck, you’re working so hard.”

You let out an affirmative and strained groan.

“You want me to cum that badly, do you?” John mutters

“Need,” you manage.

“You are such a fucking brat.”

And suddenly, one of his arms wraps around your front as tight as possible and the other lifts your leg in order to plunge deeper inside you. Each full and furious stroke strikes your nerves ecstatically. You grab onto his arm folded against your chest as he pounds into you, your mouth lolling open and eyes rolling back.

John’s face is pressed up against the side of your head, his mouth pouring tortured breaths and grunts into your ear as he undulates his hips intensely. You push your face into the pillow and let out a moan that stops and starts with each building sensation.

“Y/N, I’m – I – ” he chokes out in an attempt to give you warning of his impending orgasm. 

You are able to escape your vocalization just long enough to beg, “Cum, please, god, cum inside me, John.”

That’s enough to send him over the edge. He stifles a cry, hitched in his throat with his breath. He continues thrusting his hips, each thrust more labored than the last, as he gives you each bit of his seed. Your legs shake and your center stutters with him, taken off-guard with your own sudden rapture. The thought, the feeling of him filling you up is intoxicating.

The two of you hold each other tightly, heaving breaths. You can feel his heart beating against your back. You reach up and touch his face, your hand against his cheek. John leans in and kisses the side of your head.

“When did you get to be like that, hm?” he asks.

“Like what?” you ask and look up into his face. His eyes are dilated and heavy and his mouth is agape, trying to catch as much breath as he can.

“Like…” he says and, unable to find the word, leans in to kiss you. “Impossible.”

You laugh and unwind from him before his lips find yours. “I’m impossible?”

“It’s not a bad thing,” he says, rolling onto his back, completely spent. He puts his hand over his eyes a moment, trying to manifest some composure. “I just wanted to lazily make love to my wife and you make it impossible for me to resist practically reaming you.”

You’re not going to let him pin all this on you. “I’m not the one who wakes up with an erection.”

“Well, I can’t help that.”

“And I can’t help being impossible.”

John rolls his eyes. “Of course, you just naturally start talking about how your mouth is made for my cock first thing in the morning.”

“Yes. It’s a terrible condition, no one seems to know why I become so lewd in the mornings.”

John laughs, “What a pair we are then.”

You smile back at him and watch him a moment. He’s completely collapsed into the bed, except for his chest which is buoyantly trying to find a steady cadence of breath. The morning light diffuses through the curtains and casts him in an almost ethereal glow. So goddamn pretty.

“I just want to please you,” you say quietly.

John flushes across the bridge of his nose. “Come here, Y/N,” he says and reaches for you. It seems to take no effort for him to pull you to his chest. 

You press a kiss against his collarbone and lay your head down. His heart beat is loud against your ear. “I was made to please you.”

John lets out a sigh of contentment, his eyes fluttering shut. He holds you there, close to him. His fingers trace circles along your shoulder. “I hope I was made to please you too.”

You don’t say it out loud, but just think it. You think he’ll catch it. You were. 

The two of you lie there, in and out of post-coital haze. John’s breath is now steadied and slow and you wonder if he’s fallen asleep with you there in his arms. No doubt he could after your antics.

Your mind wanders to his semen between your legs; how you rest there, unworried by the potential repercussions. It wouldn’t be so bad, you think, to have another child within the year. You’ve gotten the hang of one, at least. You think about when you fell pregnant the first time, the way the two of you communed in joy and terror at the reality of new life unfolding between you.

If you did have another baby, would the joy be as rich and the terror as consuming? Or would each lessen and, eventually, meet in the middle? You can’t think about it too long. If it’s to be, then it’s to be. You’re comforted to know it’s worked out this far.

“You’re thinking about something.”

You look up at John, whose eyes are on you, more alert than you anticipated. “No, nothing.

“You’re wrinkling,” he replies and puts a finger at the space between your eyebrows. “Right there.”

You shake your head. “Nothing, my brain’s as empty as a broken bell.”

John’s eyes narrow, “Liar”

“Not.”

He clucks his tongue. “Y/N, what’s on your mind?” 

The light in the room catches your attention. Brighter and later. You can only imagine your daughter will be waking soon. And you don’t want to be nude when she launches herself into the room, most likely onto the bed between the two of you with energy you wish you had. 

“She’ll be up soon.” You start to slink out of bed to go for your robe which is hanging on the bedpost haphazardly.

John draws you back, “Not yet.”

You giggle. “Someone needs to be responsible,” you say, turning your head back to him and stroking his cheek. “And I think it’s my turn.”

John lets out a quiet, inadvertent whimper at your exit. You grab your robe and slip it on, going over to the window and drawing back the curtain slightly. It’s going to be a beautiful day. The doubts or questions of what’s between your legs fade from your mind. 

“You’re avoiding my question.” 

He’s usually good about dropping things, about letting you be. You sometimes wonder if he can read your thoughts or if you just think he can. “I’m not ready to say it out loud,” you say, unsure if that answer will satiate him.

John’s eyebrows rise, clearly taken off guard by what you’ve said. He opens his mouth a bit and closes it. He looks away for a long moment. You can’t tell where his mind is going or what question will come next. Instead, though, he looks back to you and gives a small nod. “Alright.”

From the other room, you hear her, calling for you. You turn suddenly to John, who now sits upright in bed. “Shorts,” he says quickly.

You look across the floor and find his striped sleep shorts peeking out from the foot of the bed where he tossed them off last night.

The antique door knob starts to creak. She calls out for you again. In a rush, you grab the shorts and toss them at your husband before making it to the door, just as she throws it open. You trap her in the doorway in a bearish embrace. “Good morning, sweet one!” you squeal.

She immediately gloms onto you and wraps her hands around your back. “Good morning!”

To buy time, you shower kisses onto her face and she laughs. You pull back and observe the imprint of her pillowcase on her face. “You must have slept like a log, look at you.”

“I did.”

“Any dreams?”

“So many.”

“Do you remember them?”

“Mmmm…no. Not really. We were on a train and it was going across the sea and – “

“Across the sea?” you hear John ask from behind you.

You turn back and see John, laid out on the bed, clad in his shorts. As if nothing could have possibly been amiss just moments before. 

“Yes!” she says. 

“Trains don’t go across the sea,” 

“They did in my dream!” she chirps before breaking into a run and launching herself onto the bed and right into John’s middle.

He gasps, the wind knocked out of him. “My goodness, did you grow in the night?” he laughs and readjusts her. “Landing on me like a sack of potatoes.” 

You walk over and perch on the edge of the bed

She grabs onto your arm, pulling you close so that she’s squeezed between the two of you. “What are we doing today?”

“Sleeping,” John says, closing his eyes.

She laughs riotously as if it’s the funniest things she’s ever heard and tap him gently on the head. “No, not today!”

“Fine, fine,” he sighs and props himself up on his elbow. John’s hair is mussed and you can’t help but giggle at him. He looks up at you, those sweet eyes trying to catch your meaning, and quickly, without words, runs a hand back through his hair. Mind reader. “What kind of adventure should we go on today, captain?”

Her thinking face is just like his. Eyes flipping up as if to grab the answer out of thin air. You both wait with bated breath before she answers, “A good one.”

John’s sleepy look melts away and he grins back at her.

And indeed, your adventures that day are good ones.

The rest of the weekend goes off without a hitch. The days are long; waterlogged hours on the beach, seaside hikes, popping in and out of town to explore the shops and eat the local fare. The three of you out and about like your own triumvirate – with your daughter as the impetuous leader, acting on each of her fancies as she sees them, John helping her navigate the trails and village streets, a right-hand man of sorts, and you leading up the rear.

You consider yourself the weak link, as much of your time is spent watching and listening. Perhaps you’re the archivist as you try to commit every moment to memory, not just with the camera you wear around your neck. You want to be able to recount them in perfect detail in a few months when John is gone again. You want to be able to lay in bed with your daughter and tell her about the look on her face when John bent a branch down from a tree that was gravid with berries, her eyes alit and mouth agape. How he helped her pick a few off carefully, so as to avoid pulling off any of the leaves. How after she devoured them, her teeth were red and rife with seeds. And how you all laughed. 

And while your records of the days you want to share with her, the memories of the nights (and early morning hours) you will want to keep for yourself.

Like tonight, when John went for a walk while you put her to bed, and upon returning, bears a bottle of wine and a small bouquet of wildflowers.

“What a sap,” you tease, taking the wildflowers from him, a beautiful array of purple, white, and orange. They’re beautiful, their petals all mingling together in celebration.

“Sticky and sweet,” he replies. 

Before you’re able to utter thank you, you see a small ant crawling down your hand. You laugh, “You’ve displaced him, John.”

“Oh no,” he replies, craning his head down to the little black bug scrambling down your arm. He puts his finger against your skin and lets the ant climb on. “Can’t have that.” He opens the door and deposits the ant back into the outdoors.

You laugh and shake your head. So goddamn tender, even with ants. “Thank you. They’re beautiful.”

“Glass of wine?”

“Please,” you answer, finding a place on the settee you two had dragged toward the windows the night before to watch the sunset. 

There is a slight hollowness to the evening. The knowledge that in the morning, you’ll make your way back down the stone steps but instead of going toward town, you’ll make the small trek back to the train station. Tomorrow night, you’ll be home again, unpacking, lounging on the couch while he plays something. There will probably be some mail to catch up on, perhaps some phone calls you need to make.

You’re afraid all of this will have been for nothing.

Your thoughts are broken when you see lightning split across the sky over the sea. “Is it supposed to rain?”

“I think so. The groundskeeper was hurrying about. And it’s quite balmy out there.” 

“I’m glad you made it back when you did, then,” you say. A sudden roll of thunder.

“Here,” he says quietly, handing you a glass of wine.

You smile in thanks and then notice the glass is heavier than you expected. “Quite full, Mr. Jones,” you say.

“Oh, darling, you deserve it,” he says with a joking, pretentious air to his voice and then goes to the doors to watch for the next bolt of lightning.

“Not any… base intentions, then,” you say before sipping the wine, a hearty red that reminds you of Christmas and berries.

“I would never,” he shakes his head and then looks back at you. “Besides, I don’t think I need wine for that.”

You look away. “Cocky tonight, hm?”

John smiles sheepishly, “On occasion.”

He’s right, though. He doesn’t. All it takes his that little look of feigned innocence and you melt.

The sound of rain tickling the window draws both your attention back to the view. Another lightning strikes. A glorious, window shaking roll of thunder. Each burst of lightning casts his shadow along the floor. John is not a tall man, but you wouldn’t know it, not from the way he carries himself (and sometimes the shoes he wears). He’s proud, but not haughty. He deserves his reputation. It’s like his stature transfers from the mental to the physical and back again. 

“Come sit with me, John” you say, drawing your legs up and patting the open space beside you.

John looks back to you and smiles. He walks past the settee into the room and shuts off the lamp you had switched on as you were getting your daughter ready for bed. Now, the room is left in darkness, except for the exquisite midnight blue light of the ocean that refracts through the raindrops clattering against the window.

Like a shadow, John appears at the side of the settee and sinks slowly down to the open place next to you. And it’s easy, the way your bodies fold into one another’s, his arm slipping around your shoulder, your hand resting on his knee. The way your lips find one another in the darkness in a passionate kiss.

He pulls away, his hand meandering through your hair. “Can I weather the storm here with you?”

“Of course, I’ll protect you.” You rest a hand on his stomach as you settle into him.

John laughs, “Thank you, I’m awfully afraid of thunder.”

You lean your glass toward his, a quiet toast, your glasses singing together. Your eyes meet. It’s bad luck to not make eye contact before you drink, or so you’ve heard. Then, you both take a sip.

“It’s good, isn’t it?” John asks.

You nod. “Very.”

“I was walking, you know, down the path by the cabins. As if you were going down to the cove,” he says, his voice resounding softly in his chest. You can feel it in your hand, the warmth and clarity of each word. “And I ran into the groundskeeper and he was pointing out all the local flora and fauna. And we walked for a bit, he wanted to show me the, um, the purple ones. Forget the name. He used the scientific name.” He casts his eyes down in his lap. He does this when telling stories, weaves the words before him. 

You lightly drum your fingers against his stomach. “Always making friends in strange places.”

He shrugs slightly, his hand slipping to your waist and pulling you closer. “Right place, right time.” Then, he clears his throat and continues, “And, well, we’re walking back, he’s remarking that it looks cloudy a bit and he has some things to finish up. And just as we’re about to splinter off, he tells me to wait while he gets something. Goes off, down a path, you know. Sort of a bumbling fellow.”

“And you were there, tapping your foot, yearning to get back to little old me, worried you’d get caught in the rain,” you wax jokingly.

“Yes!” he laughs. “You joke, but I was yearning as I always do when I’m away from you and – “

“Oh, you are a sweet talker!”

He gapes at you, “I am in earnest!”

“Of course, you are.”

”Anyway,” he rolls his eyes. “He comes back and has this bottle of wine and–” John leans in toward you and says quietly, “And he says to me, ‘Thanks for the show the other night.’”

You frown a moment before you catch his meaning. The color drains from your face. “Are you serious?”

“Deathly.”

You pull back, catching his eyes in yours. You’re having a hard time making sense of what he’s just said. You hadn’t even thought twice about your tryst on the balcony. “John – you mean to say that people heard us?”

“Heard? Darling…they were watching.”

You try to wrap your brain around how anyone would be able to see you there on the balcony. “How could they possibly?” John starts to laugh. “Why are you laughing? That’s so terribly embarrassing.”

“Oh, you poor thing, I’m joking.”

You feel your pale replaced with excessive redness. “John!” He lolls his head back with a robust laugh, exposing his Adam’s apple. “Be quiet!” you admonish him, trying to keep yourself from smiling.

“You should have seen your face!”

You try to pull away from him, “And you want me to believe that you’re earnest.”

“Y/N, I was teasing. Don’t let that ruin my reputation!”

“You’re the one who sets that reputation, Mr. Jones,” you snap. You reach over for one of the throw pillows.

“Careful, the wine!”

“You’re an ass,” you scold, pushing the pillow against his face.

He takes it from you and chucks it behind the couch, his shit-eating grin still wildly present. “Yes, I am and it was entirely worth it.”

You look at him, his eyes crinkled up. He’s so pleased with himself; you can’t help but giggle. “I hate you.”

“I’m very lucky hate and love aren’t opposites then.”

“So, what did happen?” you ask.

He purses his lips. “Don’t be cross.”

“I’m not cross.”

“You’re a little cross.”

You look away from him, both entertained and, yes, a little cross.

John nuzzles his face into your neck and kisses you gently. “You know, I sort of like when you’re a little cross.”

“Down, boy,” you slap his thigh and laugh. “You’re not done with the story. What did he actually say?” 

“Oh, he just said that I should bring it home to my ‘little lady’ and enjoy it. So…” John says and takes a drink.

You relax back into him again. “Very generous of him.”

You are about to speak when you hear the loudest crack of thunder yet. John’s arm tightens around you without thinking. Both of you look back out the window. The rain is falling in droves against the door. “A bit of a squall, isn’t it?” you ask.

It’s thrilling, the grand display of the storm, the darkness of the room, John holding you close. You sit for a few moments, staring out at the rain. The waves crashing against the cliffside louder than ever. You are in that dissonance of fear and comfort that a storm brings. Safe inside while the world around you tumbles into natural chaos. 

John breaks the silence with an intake of breath meant for words. “You know we can come back,” he says quietly, almost as if he’s afraid you’ll hear. “If you ever wanted. Next weekend even.” 

You look at him, realizing he’s been wondering the same things you have been this whole time. Will it last? Will it change? It strikes you that now, knowing that his concern matches yours, that you start to feel eagerness for the train trip home. To watch the countryside turn into familiar territory again. For the garden, even if it’s dreary. To be home again, with this newfound understanding, is now an exciting opportunity.

“Maybe. Maybe before you go again,” you say, imagining the adventures you could have again, both in the day and the night. “Maybe just the two of us next time,” you add cheekily.

He nods, “Certainly make things easier. No risk of putting on a show on the balcony.”

“I’m going to get back at you for that one.”

“I look forward to it,” John says, prodding your waist with one of his long fingers.

“But…” you take both your wine glasses and put them aside before returning to him. You cradle John’s face in your hands, examining the hard lines of his face and the way his brow curves into his elegant nose. “I want to be home with you. For a long while.”

John’s eyes lower his face growing hot in your hands. “Well, that’s good.” 

“I won’t let you hide behind the organ. And I won’t hide behind my books,” you say and lean in close to him. You press a kiss to each of his cheeks. “We still have so much catching up to do.”

John’s blue eyes look back into yours, wavering slightly. “That’s true. In many senses,” he half smiles and runs his hands from your waist to the middle of your back. “Perhaps we need to stop pretending like we’ll just naturally understand how this works. What with me traveling and you having to play house alone.”

“It isn’t a very natural situation.”

“No, it isn’t.”

You slip your arms around his neck and lean into his ear. “But we have time,” you reassure.

You both know the time will go quicker than you think, like trying to hold water in your hands. It doesn’t stay. There will come a moment in his time home that you both realize there is less time left than you both want. Perhaps you’ll get upset with one another and waste a day or two when really you’re just aching to be left alone in the world together.

Rain continues to pour down as the two of you embrace on the settee. Nowhere else to go but further into each other’s’ arms. With so much time apart and the exuberance of your sexual appetite, you’ve barely taken time just to be with one another like this. John buries his face in your shoulder. “And will you let me know when you’re ready then? To say what you’ve been thinking out loud?” John asks, an urging in his voice.

You sigh. Not tonight, but… “I will. I promise.” And you mean it.

“I’m holding you to it, Y/N.”

“Hold me to it, then.”

“I’d like to know every thought you’re thinking, if I could.”

Lightning, closely followed by thunder. You jump. “Goodness,” you exclaim. And not far behind your exclamation is a wild cry from the other room.

You both start to get up, but John waves you off, “I’ve got it.”

He disappears into your daughter’s room, where she continues to wail for a bit longer. You hear John’s mellow voice coo to her softly. It’s a voice he saves for her and, even though you can’t make out the words, it’s so pleasing to hear. Eventually, her laugh rings out from the room. You can’t help but smile hearing it. 

You continue to watch the rain and listen to the babbling in the other room. It’s much more fun to play house with someone, rather than tending to it alone. And yet your independence comes so naturally at this point, you realize that perhaps his returns are marked by your steadfastness to keep things your way too.

“Can we join you?”

You look up at John, carrying your daughter wrapped in a wool blanket, her eyes imploring you to say yes (as if you would ever say no). “Of course,” you say and move over to make room for them. “Did the storm scare you, sweet girl?”

She nods into John’s shoulder. You know she’s upset when she doesn’t have anything to say. John sinks down into the spot next to you and you reach for her, for the both of them. “She was having a bad dream,” John says on her behalf.

“And the storm woke you up, did it?” you ask without needing an answer. “Have you watched the rain yet?”

“No,” she squeaks.

You raise your eyebrows, “You mean you haven’t watched how the raindrops race one another yet?”

She lifts her head slightly and looks out the window, her big eyes raw from crying. “Not yet.”

You all look out at the window, bathed all in cerulean. Lightning comes and goes again, so does the thunder. When it does, she locks her hands around your arm, but doesn’t take her eyes off the window, watching them race.

And then you feel his eyes on you, in your periphery, you can see him admiring you. Him admiring you, admiring her, admiring the rain. You turn your gaze toward him, but when your eyes meet, you both look away, too bashful to be caught.

Seems so foolish, considering the positions you two get yourselves into, but, god, does it fill you with butterflies.

The time goes by, conversation comes and goes, all the way to the middle of the night. The storm has abated to just a steady drizzle. You and John are both laid out on the couch, as tight as can be, with her resting on his chest. She finally begins to nod off as you hum something you heard off Tapestry, which John brought back for you. By the time you’re done, she started snoring softly.

You look up at John about to say something, but his heavy lids are shut now, his mouth slightly ajar.

You grin. You grin so hard your cheeks hurt.


End file.
